Erik ten Hag’s agent ruffling feathers at Man Utd with approaches to academy stars amid growing transfer influence
DONNY VAN DE BEEK has been put out of his misery at Manchester United by joining Eintracht Frankfurt on loan.
Arriving from Ajax in a £40million deal in 2020 and on wages of £125,000 a week, Van de Beek is one of many recent disasters at Old Trafford.
Manager Erik ten Hag has been rightly hammered for his terrible moves in the transfer market, most notably winger Antony (£85.5m) midfielder Casemiro (£70m) and keeper Andre Onana (47.2m).
England midfielder Mason Mount (£60m) has been hit with injuries and £72m forward Rasmus Hojlund is a raw talent.
Even so, former boss Ole Gunnar Solskjaer must still take a huge amount of blame for his own poor signings — and United are still paying the price.
While there were other people in the background, including the recruitment department, United did not sign a single player without the nod from Ole.
So on top of Van de Beek, the arrivals of Jadon Sancho, Aaron Wan-Bissaka and the return of Cristiano Ronaldo were all signed off by the Norwegian.
Mind you, Solskjaer also bought some poor players at Cardiff.
Yesterday marked ten years since he took over in South Wales and club owner Vincent Tan made it clear his lucky number was eight.
Ole’s first signing was Magnus Wolff Eikrem from Heerenveen, a midfielder the coach had worked with at Molde.
FREE BETS – BEST BETTING OFFERS & NEW CUSTOMER BONUSES
Maybe it was a handy coincidence that Eikrem’s birthdate was August 8.
However, back at United and you would still rate Ten Hag’s record in the transfer market — considering the sums spent — worse than Solskjaer’s.
There has also been alarm over his agent, Kees Vos, and his growing involvement in transfers at the club.
Vos’ Sports Entertainment Group represent Hojlund, who joined the agency a month before the United deal went through.
They also acted on behalf of United during negotiations to bring Sofyan Amrabat on loan from Fiorentina.
Equally, SunSport understands that SEG have ruffled the feathers of the agents of some of United’s younger players in the academy.
SEG, as does happen in football, have tried to get the players to leave their current agents and move over to them instead.